Part 32 (1/2)
Had Dr. Trenire been at home he would have interfered, and rescued her from her wraps and shawls, heavy serge frock, woollen stockings, and innumerable warm garments; or, perhaps, if Anna had not been so afraid of her mother, but had appealed to her candidly and without fear, she might have obtained relief. This, unfortunately, was not Anna's way, for Anna's ways were still as crooked and s.h.i.+fty as her glances. She would think out this plan and that plan to avoid the only one that was straightforward and right, though it must be said for her that she did try to be more open and honourable--at times she tried quite hard; but since Kitty had gone, and she had been so much with her mother, all her old foolish fears of her had come back with renewed strength, and all her old mean ways and crooked plans for getting her own way and escaping scoldings.
Now, instead of asking to be relieved from some of her burdensome clothing, she made up her mind to destroy the things she detested most, and trust to not being found out; or, if she was found out--well, ”the things must have been lost at the laundry.” This seemed to her an excellent explanation.
So, one day when her mother was out and Betty and Tony had gone for a drive with Dr. Yearsley, Anna betook herself to the garden with some of her most loathed garments under her arm, and a box of matches in her pocket. A bonfire on a summer's day is easy to ignite, and there was just sufficient breeze to fan the flame to active life, so Anna was in the midst of her work of destruction almost before she realized it.
But, while waiting for her mother to depart, Anna had forgotten that the time was hurrying on towards Betty's and Tony's return. In fact, they drove up but a moment or so after she had left the house on her guilty business.
”Miss Anna has gone up the garden,” said f.a.n.n.y in answer to Betty's inquiries; and Betty, following her slowly, was in time to see a blaze leaping up, and a cloud of smoke and sparks. She quickened her steps, for something interesting seemed to be happening. ”Surely Anna isn't trying to smoke out that wasps' nest,” she thought in sudden alarm.
”She will be stung to death if she is,” and Betty took to her heels to try to stop her. But when she got past the rows of peas and beans that had hidden Anna, she saw that what her cousin was poking up was not a wasps' nest, but a heap that was blazing on the ground.
”What are you doing?” gasped Betty excitedly. ”What a lovely fire!”
At the sound of a voice Anna spun round quickly, the very picture of frightened guilt; but when she saw Betty her fear turned to anger, hot and uncontrollable because she was frightened.
”You are always spying and prying after me,” she cried pa.s.sionately.
”Why can I never have a moment to myself? Other people can, and why can't I?”
Poor Anna was hot and overdone, and her nerves were so much on edge that she scarcely knew what she was doing or saying. But Betty had no knowledge of nerves, and under this unfair accusation she could make no allowance for her cousin, and her temper rose too.
”How dare you say I pry and spy! You know it is not true, Anna. I only came to ask you to play with us, and--and how was I to know that you were doing something that you didn't want any one to see? Why don't you want any one to see you? What are you burning?” Betty stepped nearer and looked more closely. ”O Anna, it is your clothes that you are burning. Oh, how did it happen? You didn't do it on purpose, did you?”
”It doesn't matter to you how it happened. If _you_ don't want to wear things you hate, you just go and tell tales to your father. You can get everything you want. But I haven't any one to stick up for me, and I've _got_ to do things for myself.”
”Then you set this on fire on purpose! Oh, how wicked; and they cost such a lot too! I wonder you aren't afraid to be so wicked!” cried Betty indignantly.
”I don't care,” said Anna, trying to put on a bold front. ”I never did want the things, and I never shall. I should die if I went about much longer a perfect mountain of clothes. How would you like to wear a 'hug-me-tight' under a serge coat in this weather?”
”Not at all. But what shall you say to Aunt Pike?”
”I shan't say anything; but I suppose you will,” sneered Anna.
”I do wish you wouldn't be always poking and prying about where you are not wanted. You might know that people like to be left alone sometimes.”
”I am sure,” cried Betty, quite losing her temper at that, ”I would leave you quite alone always, if I could; and I am _not_ a sneak, and that you know. It would have been better for Kitty if I had been.
I don't know how you can say such things as you do, Anna, when you know what we have had to bear for you. I suppose you think I don't know that it was you who should have been sent away from Miss Richards's, and not Kitty! But I do know--I have known it all the time, though Kitty wouldn't tell me--and I think that you and Lettice Kitson are the two meanest, wickedest girls in all the world to let Kitty bear the blame all this time and never clear her. But after this--”
”Betty!” Aunt Pike's voice rose almost to a scream to get above the torrent of Betty's indignation. ”How _dare_ you speak to Anna so!
How _dare_ you say such shocking things! You dreadful, naughty child, you are in such a pa.s.sion you don't know what you are saying, and you are making Anna quite ill! Look at her, poor child!--Anna dear, come to me; you look almost fainting, and I really don't wonder.”
Anna was certainly ghastly white, and trembling uncontrollably, but as much at the sight of her mother as from Betty's fiery onslaught.
”Yes--I do feel faint,” she gasped, but she was able to walk quickly to her mother's side, and to lead her at a brisk step away from that smouldering heap on the ground.
”Poor child, I will take you to your room. You must lie down and keep very quiet for a time.--Elizabeth, follow us, please, and wait for me in the dining-room. I will come and speak to you there when I have seen to Anna. In the meantime try to calm yourself, and prepare to apologize for the dreadful things I heard you saying.”
Betty did not reply, nor for a few moments did she attempt to follow.
Her aunt's determination to believe Anna all that was good and innocent and injured, and herself and Kitty all that was mean and bad, increased her resentment a thousand times. Betty could never endure injustice.
”I won't apologize. I won't. I can't. I couldn't. I have nothing to apologize for,” she thought indignantly. ”It is Aunt Pike who ought to do that, and Anna, and ask us to forgive them. I've a good mind to tell everything. I think it is my duty to Kitty and all of us!” and Betty strutted down the garden looking very determined and important.
Her childlike face was undaunted, her little mouth set firm.
”It is my duty to all of us,” she kept repeating to herself; ”it really is. I am not going to let Kitty bear the blame always. I know that most people feel quite sure that she really did carry those letters, and then wouldn't own up, but told stories about it, and Aunt Pike has never been nice to her since, and Lady Kitson scarcely speaks to her, and Miss Richards doesn't speak at all, and--and that mean Anna won't clear her, and--”